The Worst of All Possible Worlds

147 - Chrono Trigger (feat. Anime Sickos)

Tom and Joe (Anime Sickos) throw the lads in the Epoch and hop through time as they cover Square’s landmark 1995 RPG: Chrono Trigger. Topics include the thrill of flame tornados, the anxieties of action time battle, and the importance of camaraderie in the face of an apocalyptic DJ from space.

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Anime Sickos: A podcast for geniuses about the four pillars of modern misery: anime, gaming, posting, & jobs. Starring Tom & Joe. New episodes every Wednesday.

Patreon // Twitter // Tumblr

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Chrono Trigger. Square, 1995.
• Chrono Trigger – 1995 Developer Interviews - shmuplations.com

Commercial: “A Message from the Nu”

• O-Zone - Dragostea Din Tei (Remix in style of Sega Genesis 16 bit)

146 - Shrimp Jesus and the Death of Facebook

THIS IS A PREVIEW. FOR THE FULL EPISODE, GO TO Patreon.com/worstofall

The lads made this episode with their own hands! 😊 Why do episodes like this never get likes? 😢💔 AmenAmenAmen. 🙏🇺🇸 It is our birthday and nobody wished us one. So excited to begin our cake journey. 🎂 Did you notice when it left you? Why don’t you see these anymore? Gone too soon! ✝️ The joy, the bursts of pleasure, the camaraderie? She did good work, we’re so proud of her! 🤩 This is a place of ghosts. King Charles visited Sudan to feed the hungry children! 🫅🇸🇩 And soon you will join us in the mist. Wow, made it to 100, who else can relate? 💯 Amen.

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Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Facebook blog posts
  • September 5, 2006 - Facebook deprecates the original Wall in favor of the News Feed. A post made to someone else’s profile can now show up on the home page of anyone who is friends with that person
  • September 5, 2006 - Mark Zuckerberg makes a highly defensive and condescending post responding to negative feedback about the shift to the news feed
  • September 8, 2006 - Zucc makes a considerably more measured follow-up post introducing new privacy settings but doubling down on his commitment to “free flow of information on the internet”
  • November 6, 2007 - Facebook introduces its new social ad platform in tandem with Pages, implementing the final piece of its core user monetization strategy
  • February 12, 2009 - Facebook introduces the Like button
  • February 24, 2016 - Facebook rolls out Reactions (love, haha, wow, sad, angery) globally

• News articles:
  • “Ted Cruz using firm that harvested data on millions of unwitting Facebook users” by Harry Davies. The Guardian. December 11th, 2015.
  • “A timeline of Facebook's privacy issues — and its responses” by Alyssa Newcomb. NBC News. March 24, 2018
  • “Five Points for Anger, One for a ‘Like’: How Facebook’s Formula Fostered Rage and Misinformation” by Jeremy B. Merrill and Will Oremus. Washington Post. October 26th, 2021
  • How Spammers, Scammers and Creators Leverage AI-Generated Images on Facebook for Audience Growth by Renee DiResta and Josh A. Goldstein. Pre-print paper, Stanford University.
  • Facebook’s Algorithm Is Boosting AI Spam That Links to AI-Generated, Ad-Laden Click Farms by Jason Koebler. 404 Media, March 19, 2024
  • Facebook’s AI Spam Isn’t the ‘Dead Internet’: It’s the Zombie Internet by Jason Koebler. 404 Media, May 2, 2024

• Misc.
  • ”AI is Ruining the Internet” by Drew Gooden.

Commercial: “Scrolling Through Your Old Facebook Feed at 4AM”

• Round Here Piano Cover by John Baumgardn

145 - Dragon Ball Z (feat. Alex Ptak)

Alex Ptak (Quorators) and the lads check their power levels and slap each other silly as they cover the finale of the Frieza arc of Akira Toriyama’s seminal 90’s anime: Dragon Ball Z. Topics include the complex logistics of wishes, the gorgeous design of the characters, and the eternal popularity of a ripped protagonist who can eat and eat and eat and never, EVER get full.

 

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Alex Ptak - Twitter // Instagram

Quorators - Every Monday, comedians Jeremy Kaplowitz and Alex Ptak head to Quora dot com to find the stupidest questions they can and make fun of them.

Youtube // Patreon // Apple Podcasts // Spotify

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Dragon Ball Z. Toei Animation. Created by Akira Toriyama.

• • S3, Ep 80: “Transformed at Last”
  • S3, Ep 81: “Explosion of Anger”
  • S3, Ep 82: “Namek’s Destruction?”
  • S3, Ep 83: “A Final Attack”
  • S3, Ep 84: “Approaching Destruction”
  • S3, Ep 85: “Gohan’s Return”
  • S3, Ep 86: “The Last Wish”
  • S3, Ep 87: “Duel on a Vanishing Planet”
  • S3, Ep 88: “Pathos of Frieza”
  • S3, Ep 89: “Frieza Defeated!!”
  • S3, Ep 90: “Mighty Blast of Rage”

• “Finding Ourselves in Dragon Ball” by Bradford William Davis. Slate. March 13th, 2024.
• “In Celebration of Goku, A Latino Icon” by JP Brammer. Los Angeles Times. August 10th, 2023.

 

Commercial: All-You-Can-Inflate

 

144 - Dr. Dobson’s “Wooton Hears a Woo(ton)!” [Whit’s Endless Summer 36]

THIS IS A PREVIEW. FOR THE FULL EPISODE, GO TO Patreon.com/worstofall

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In preparation for their pilgrimage to Colorado Springs, Colorado, the lads take a gander at what the heck’s been going on in Odyssey in recent years and finally meet everybody’s favorite mail-delivering Odyssian: Wooton Bassett. Topics include the zombification of Odyssey, Focus on the Family’s financial troubles, and sheer terror of watching your childhood hero become a sentient garden gnome.

LIVE SHOW TICKETS AVAILABLE NOW

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Adventures in Odyssey

• • #472 - “Welcoming Wooton”
  • #734 - “Life Expectancy, Part 1”
  • #735 - “Life Expectancy, Part 2"
  • #736 - “Life Expectancy, Part 3”
  • #750 - “All By Myself”
  • #807 - “Connie the Counselor”
• The Fanart Where Wooton Bassett Looks Exactly Like 16 Year Old A.J.

TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com

Commercial: “Smileytown Employee Training Video”

143 - Dennis Prager’s For Goodness Sake (feat. Tall Bart)

Tall Bart (@verytallbart) joins the lads for another dip into the Prager Pool as they interrogate the painful sketch comedy and baby-brained moralizing of Dennis Prager’s educational video series: For Goodness Sake. Topics include Prager’s unique rhetorical style, the bafflingly high-profile cast, and how David Zucker, Trey Parker, and Matt Stone had their hand in helping Dennis Prager tell the world about just how much he hates babies.

Tall Bart: Twitter // Youtube // Twitch

Our August 4 live show in Colorado Springs is now on sale! Get your tickets here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-worst-of-all-possible-worlds-live-in-colorado-springs-tickets-928138165237

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• The For Goodness Sake Playlist:

• • For Goodness Sake dir. David Zucker, 1993.
  • For Goodness Sake 2 dir. Trey Parker, 1996.
  • Character: Who Needs It (Training Version), 1996.
  • “Who is Dennis Prager?” by PragerU, 2019.
  • “Are People Born Good?” by PragerU, 2014.

• “Mixed Messages : Simpson Is Hastily Edited Out of Film on Values, but Some Prefer the Original” by Gordon Dillow. Los Angeles Times. June 22nd, 1994.
• “O.J. Simpson Has Cameo In Training Movie About Ethics, Morality With AM-Simpson-Abuse Laws” by Lynn Elber. Associated Press. June 22nd, 1994.

TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com

Commercial: “For Goodn3ss Sak3 3”

142 - Gerbert (feat. Devon and Trinket)

THIS IS A PREVIEW. FOR THE FULL EPISODE, GO TO Patreon.com/worstofall

Devon and Trinket (Traditional Scrench) join the lads for some adventures in Christian puppetry as they dive into the rich tapestry of Bible stories and malevolent paint brush gods that is: Gerbert. Topics include UK children’s programming, the militarism of evangelical ideology, and the dangers of giving tuppence to birds.

Devon: Twitter // Bluesky

Trinket: Twitter // Bluesky

Traditional Scrench: Your favourite podcast idiots are streaming twice a week, every week, at 21:00 UK time Monday and Thursday. We’re a heavily improvised variety stream with a youtube playlist.

• Twitch

24 Bauer Party People: Sam and Trinket marathon watch 24, taking breaks every 4 episodes to record a podcast. Trinket knows nothing about 24, but she’s wearing a shoulder holster full of monster energy cans to try and get into the spirit of things and she’s ready to enter the mind of the neo-con.

• Spotify // Apple Podcasts

Kill James Bond! is a comedy film review/pop culture commentary podcast about the eponymous English spy, James Bond. November Kelly, Abigail Thorn, and Devon watch a different Bond movie every fortnight in an attempt to give 007 the socialist, feminist comeuppance he so richly deserves. Free episodes are released every fortnight on all major podcast platforms and bonus episodes are released for supporters on Patreon on the interstitial weeks.

• Website / Twitter / Patreon
• Listen on Apple Podcasts / Spotify / Google Podcasts

Well There’s Your Problem is a podcast about engineering disasters and systemic failures, from a leftist perspective, with jokes.

• Youtube / Twitter / Instagram / Patreon
• Listen on Apple Podcasts / Spotify / Google Podcasts

Ten Thousand Posts: A show about how everything is a form of posting, and how our lives are guided by the only dialectic that matters: good posts and bad posts.

• Podcast // Twitter // Patreon

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Boys’ Bible Study - Gerbert feat. Andy Holmes
• Gerbert

• • #7 “I’m All Right/The Doctor”
  • #21 “Listening is Loving/Listening Skills”
  • #29 “Being Franklin”
  • #50 “Gerbert: The Gift of Giving”

TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com

Commercial: “Binney Brush: The Lost Episode” feat. Matt Cox as “Binney Brush”

141 - Team America: World Police (feat. Stephen Stout)

Stephen Stout (Puffs) and the lads hop into their red, white, and blue helicopters and completely obliterate France as they cover Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s 2004 fraught satire of the War on Terror: Team America: World Police. Topics include Parker and Stone’s origins, the film’s overwhelming racism, and what a movie so steeped in the post-9/11 hysteria of the early 2000s means twenty years after its release.

Stephen Stout: Twitter // Instagram // Spock Hats Twitter

Puffs: Website // Amazon // Broadway HD

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Team America: World Police. Dir. Trey Parker and Matt Stone. 2004.
• “Launching a small-scale offensive” by John Horn. The Los Angeles Times. Sept. 12th, 2004.
• “Team America-World Police: Down-Home Theories of Power and Peace” by James Gow. Millenium: Journal of International Studies. Volume 34, Issue 2. February 2006.
• “Playboy Interview: Parker & Stone” by Playboy Staff. June 2000.
• “Puppet Masters - Interview with Matt Stone and Trey Parker” by Heather Havrilesky. Salon. October 12th, 2004.

TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com

Commercial: “TWOAPW, Fuck Yeah (Abridged)”

140 - Doki Doki Literature Club! (feat. Anne Huston)

THIS IS A PREVIEW. FOR THE FULL EPISODE, GO TO Patreon.com/worstofall

 

Anne Huston (Caveat NYC) joins Brian and Josh in getting bombarded by the twee writing, adorable anime girls, and abject existential terror of Team Salvato's 2017 dating sim/horror cult hit Doki Doki Literature Club! Along the way they talk about the appeal of fanworks, the perils of adolescence, and the mortifying ordeal of being known by a fictitious character inside a computer game.

Anne Huston is the General Manager at Caveat, a cabaret comedy theatre located on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

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Media referenced in this episode:

• Doki Doki Literature Club! (Team Salvato, 2017) available on itch.io
• Doki Doki Literature Club Plus! (Team Salvato/Serenity Forge, 2021) available on Steam
• Undertale (Toby Fox, 2015) available on Steam
• Year Walk (Simogo, 2013) available on the App Store and Steam
• Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem (Silicon Knights/Nintendo, 2002)

TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com

Interstitial: "A Series of Updates from the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority re: Dupont Circle and Farragut North Metro Stations"

139 - The Dutch Knight Rises (feat. Scott Benson) [Whit’s Endless Summer #35]

Scott Benson (Night in the Woods) returns once again to Odyssey as he and the lads finally wrap up their three-part coverage of the many spy-games, double-crosses, and hastily wedged in Christian morals of the epic, twelve-part Adventures in Odyssey saga: Darkness Before Dawn. Topics include the wiki-centric writing, the benefits of pirate mutiny, and what it means to grow up believing that certain souls are beyond redemption.

Scott Benson - Twitter // Instagram

Previously on Whit’s Endless Summer:

• The Odyssey Commercials Vol. 1
• Blackgaard Begins (feat. Devon) [Whit’s Endless Summer 33]
• The Dutch Knight (feat. Trevor Strunk) [Whit’s Endless Summer 34]

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Adventures in Odyssey
• #331: Checkmate
• #332: Another Chance
• #333: The Last Resort
• #334: The Final Conflict

• Is AIDs [sic] a Result of God's Punishment? by James Dobson.
• Connie’s Special Bible - NKI - Adventures in Odyssey [Archive of Our Own]

 

TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com

Commercial: “The Light Before Dusk”

• Part One: “Oily Marks”
• Part Two: “Blood and Tears” feat. Brendan Dalton as “318"
• Park Three: “Still Life” feat. Eleanor Philips as “???” and Brendan Dalton as “318”
• Part Four: “What Did You Say?” feat. Maki Borden as “Pete”

Music Used in the Commercials:

• The “Hide and Seeks”:

• • Acapella Cover by 4inabar
  • Organ Cover by Jonny Music
  • Piano Cover by Blake Alkire
  • Piano and String Cover by Brooklyn Duo feat. Dover Quartet
  • Violin Cover by Arlo Adams

• The Underscoring:

• • “There Will be Blood” by Jonny Greenwood
  • “The Hunt” by Jonny Greenwood

138 - Baby Reindeer

THIS IS A PREVIEW. FOR THE FULL EPISODE, GO TO Patreon.com/worstofall

The lads grab their iFoNeS and spam your inbox as they dive headlong into the nightmarish world of stalking and stand up comedy that is Richard Gadd’s hit 2024 Netflix series: Baby Reindeer. Topics include the show’s origins as autobiography, the incredible performances, and what, if anything, artists owe their real-life subjects in a world addicted to true crime.

 

CW: Frank discussions of sexual assault and stalking.

 

Media Referenced in this Episode:

• Baby Reindeer. Netflix, 2024.
• “‘Baby Reindeer’ Star Richard Gadd Questioned By Producers Over Dating Actress Who Auditioned For Hit Netflix Series” by Jake Kanter. Deadline. May 3rd, 2024.
• Reddit Thread About Richard Gadd’s Previous Edinburgh Shows
• “Richard Gadd on Baby Reindeer-the shocking truth behind the Netflix hit” by Susannah Butter. The Times. January 21st, 2024.

TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com

Commercial: “The Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2024"